Besides claiming that it has not violated any of SCOs copyrights, IBM also used the motion, filed March 26, to ask that SCOs claims be dismissed on the grounds that SCO, as a Linux vendor that has released code under the GPL (GNU Public License), cannot now add new restrictions on the Linux source code.

Similar arguments have been made against SCOs copyright cases in public forums for months. "This is a really obvious move," said Stacey Quandt, principal analyst at Quandt Analytics.
But the move does not mean that the SCO-IBM legal saga will be ending shortly. The discovery process first must run its course, and that alone could take years. Only then could the judge grant the motion.
Quandt said she thinks that win, lose or draw, open source has changed forever. "This isnt the end of these kinds of actions. There is a potential that other companies will follow SCO in suing open-source vendors and users.
"Companies will be evaluating risk management for Linux and open source," she said. "In turn, this means that businesses that develop indemnification plans [such as Open Source Risk Management] or mitigate copyright risks in software [such as Black Duck Software Inc.] will do well."
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Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is editor at large for Ziff Davis Enterprise. Prior to becoming a technology journalist, Vaughan-Nichols worked at NASA and the Department of Defense on numerous major technological projects. Since then, he's focused on covering the technology and business issues that make a real difference to the people in the industry.